Website Blocking in the EU: Risks and CEPS Recommendations

# Criticism of Website Blocking Systems in the EU: Risks to Legitimate Traffic and Infrastructure

The independent think tank CEPS has published a report harshly criticizing the mechanisms for blocking web resources at the initiative of rights holders in several European Union countries. The study shows that current schemes are not only ineffective in combating piracy but also create systemic risks to legitimate internet infrastructure and user rights.

The Problem of Rights Holders Lacking Accountability

The report's key finding is that rights holders initiating blocks bear no direct costs or legal responsibility for the consequences of their requests. This encourages the use of maximally aggressive measures without assessing side effects. As a result, legitimate services sharing infrastructure with pirate sites regularly face mass restrictions.

In Italy, the Piracy Shield system allows blocking domains and IP addresses within 30 minutes of notification, without prior court ruling. This approach has already led to serious incidents: in January 2026, the Italian regulator AGCOM fined Cloudflare $14.2 million for refusing to implement global filtering on its DNS server 1.1.1.1. The company cited the technical impossibility of localizing the block without disrupting legitimate customers.

Mass Blocks and Collateral Damage

A similar precedent occurred in Spain in February 2025. There, a single decision blocked not only the target pirate resources but also about 3,300 legitimate services hosted on Cloudflare infrastructure. The company's court appeal was rejected in March of the same year, despite presented technical evidence of excessive block scope.

Such cases demonstrate the fundamental problem with IP and domain blocks: they ignore the modern architecture of CDNs and shared hosting, where thousands of independent projects use the same IP addresses or domain zones. Blocking at this level inevitably affects innocent resources.

Effectiveness of Blocks: Data vs. Myths

CEPS cites independent studies confirming that blocks have only a short-term effect. Users quickly find workarounds—mirrors, VPNs, Tor, or alternative DNS resolvers. Meanwhile, the long-term impact of such measures on piracy volumes remains understudied.

Moreover, the lack of transparent statistics and mandatory impact assessments makes objective effectiveness analysis impossible. In most EU countries, there are no requirements for monitoring collateral damage or public reporting on the number of erroneously blocked resources.

CEPS Recommendations for Balanced Policy

The center proposed 12 specific measures to improve fairness and effectiveness of anti-piracy mechanisms:

• Abandon IP blocks in favor of targeted methods (URL or DNS level).
• Introduce mandatory prior court review before blocking.
• Require rights holders to compensate providers for block implementation costs.
• Establish legal liability for damage caused by excessive or erroneous blocks.
• Block duration should be limited and subject to regular review.
• Require technical justification for the scale and method of blocking.
• Prioritize enforcement against direct infringers, not infrastructure intermediaries.
• Develop affordable and flexible content licensing models.
• Launch user education campaigns.
• Create an independent appeals mechanism for legitimate resource owners.
• Ensure transparency of block data for public oversight.
• Implement testing for block "cleanliness" before activation.

The British Model as a Benchmark

According to CEPS, the most balanced system operates in the UK. There, blocks:

• always require a court order;
• are limited in duration;
• must be accompanied by technical justification;
• undergo risk assessment for impacting legitimate content.

This approach minimizes collateral damage and maintains trust in the enforcement system.

Key Points:

• IP and domain blocks are incompatible with modern CDN architecture.
• Lack of accountability for rights holders leads to abuses.
• Block effects are short-term, with no long-term data.
• Targeted methods (URL/DNS) and judicial oversight are key to balance.
• The UK demonstrates a working model balancing copyright protection and user rights.

— Editorial Team